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Raiding - The Guide to Underhanded Warfare
}} StarMade PVP: Raiding This is a game of warfare. All is fair in love and war, and nowhere is this more true than when conducting raids. Raids are a healthy part of server life, they indicate that progress is being made, they keep vets on the alert, and show new players how the game works. Stealing everything that isn't nailed down — and some that is So, you don't like direct combat and envy the creations around you? This is for you. This is the art of stealing ships from factions and lone wolves. A good practice is to mark down all bases which are not home bases you run across as these are most vulnerable. Build a cloaked ship and scout all the large factions as well as small, you'll be surprised by what small factions can muster. Notice something big you want? Write its location down. Once you know where and who to steal from, build a ship capable of dropping the shields of the ship you want and fly over there. Unfortunately docked ships at home bases are untouchable save for the rare glitch in your favor, but you'll soon learn that people leave their creations undocked far more than they should. New players, especially, will build a box station, maybe a door, and leave the ships simply floating around inside, having no experience with docking before. Larger ships that carry active turrets cannot dock until their turrets are removed. This is because of the lack of "chain-docking" being implemented. In order for a player to secure their ship to a station, they must first enter each turret and land it somewhere else on said station, or simply turn in its AI and let it fly. If you're lucky, you can find a Battleship or larger undocked, waiting to be unloaded so it can be docked. If you do find this, rush the unlucky chum and you may get away with a sweet score. However, if their faction has declared neutral as hostile, their still-active or already-active ship or base turrets can take you out long before you get close enough to do damage. Beware factions with neutral declared as hostile, as their AI turrets on stations can kill you before you can do anything. A common newbie mistake is to use a "bike-lock" tether. This is a mistake on their part as you only have to drop their shields to reset their faction block and enter their ship. From there, delete the lock and fly away. Around faction bases you can often find even Frigates and Cruisers undocked ripe for the taking. A prime time to steal something that'd normally be docked is right after server crashes because people may have been moving, building, or testing their large ships. Stealing is a fair practice because everyone needs to learn to dock their stuff. Newbies that disregard this fact may learn to dock things the hard way, but it's better to lose a poorly designed frigate now than a battleship down the road. The Power Struggle It is important for established factions to assert their dominance in their servers. It's fun to have to rally together to beat a massive homebase. If one is an established faction in a server with few, it's a good idea to conduct raids early and often to keep people from growing too strong. In general one should use a cloaker to preemptively scout targets. Go to the largest secondary faction you can easily put down, and scout them. They have a new battleship midway through construction? Bring yours, plus several escorts and put it down before it's off the ground. Do this to as many factions as possible. You run the risk of making many enemies, but players who don't suffer will probably want to join you and more enemies = more fun in a game of warfare. The best possible targets are factions without home bases. If a server has a hegemon or several superpower factions (relative terms considering low general population) many smaller 1-5 man factions will decide to not have home bases. This is a move to opt for stealth as their base would not show up on the faction hub, however, in the end they will be the least lucky of any, because once they're found, many people will be after them. Since they have no home, everything can be taken or destroyed. They are always found out and always destroyed. If you're thinking about doing this, don't. Just deal with occasional raids, and remember to dock your ships. Satisfaction Using both these strategies, you can grow your factions power, presence, and fleet numbers while decreasing opponents. Ships recieved in raids are commonly converted into raiders themselves. If a stolen or raided ship is unusually awful, the owner will often buy it back if you weren't ungentlemanly about taking it. Ransoming ships is a great way to get bulks of blocks for recipes you wouldn't normally get. On a final note, don't raid the newest players. They hardly know anything and their ships aren't worth the time to fly out and get them, and they may rage quit. Stick to newish players with frigates or cruises. Stolen ships are also usually of poor design, so needing to completely redo the interior and systems is not uncommon. Category:Your Base Category:Community Category:Tutorials